Mid Atlantic Brewing News February/March 2010 : Page 1

By Greg Kitsock By The Brews Brothers (Steve Frank & Arnold Meltzer) ll hail the humble beer can. It made its debut to thunderous applause 75 years ago, on Jan. 24, 1935, in Richmond, Va. This year, Americans will drain over 30 billion of them. The great majority contain mass-market lager, but smaller brewers are also discover- ing the joys of aluminum. Over 50 U.S. and 23 Canadian craft breweries now are can- ning beer, including such Mid-Atlantic oper- ations as Pennsylvania’s Sly Fox Brewery, Blue Mountain Brewery in Afton, Va. and 16 Mile Brewing Co. in Georgetown, Del. One of the biggest obstacles to craft beer in cans has been the container’s plebeian image. When the craft beer revolution threw open the pearly gates to beer nirvana, better beers came in bottles and kegs only. Cans, except for an occasional ale or bock, con- tained insipid, light lagers, suitable only for chugging. What associations did cans conjure up? Maybe Archie Bunker in his easy chair pop- ping open a cold one, or frat boys crushing the empties against their foreheads. But the range of styles in cans is expand- ing continually. Caldera Brewing Co. in Ashland, Ore. cans an aggressively hopped West Coast IPA. Oskar Blues in Lyons, Colo. markets an inky black, 9.5%-abv imperial stout called Ten Fidy. The 21st Amendment Brewery in San Francisco recently released Monk’s Blood in cans, a dark ale brewed with cinnamon, vanilla, oak chips and dried figs. See Cans p.4 he Food and Drug Administration claims that it isn’t targeting cof- fee-flavored drinks as part of its crackdown on caffeinated alcoholic beverages, launched last November. However, the agency’s harsh stance—it insists that there are no food additive regu- lations that permit the addition of caffeine at T any level in alcoholic beverages —has raised concern that craft brewers’ coffee beers might get caught in the dragnet. On Nov. 13, the FDA sent a letter to about 30 drinks companies, giving them a month to provide “supporting data and information” that their use of caffeine is safe or has received prior sanction. The let- See Caffeine p.6 IN THIS ISSUE Collecting Beer Cans for Fun and Fortune ...... 7 Book Review .................................................. 9 Are Cans a Health Hazard?.......................... ... 10 Homebrew ..................................................... 36 Calendar of Craft Beer Events ......................... 39 E.Pennsylvania ..... 12 C. Pennsylvania ....22 Philadelphia .......... 24 Virginia ................ 26 Maryland ............. 28 Baltimore .............. 30 West Virginia ....... 32 Delaware .............. 33 New Jersey........... 34 Washington, DC ... 38